"SANTA FE -- The New Mexico Environmental Law Center today appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a lower court decision that allows uranium mining in the Four Corners region of New Mexico. The appeal claims the mine would contaminate drinking water used by some 15,000 Navajo people.

Two community groups - the Eastern Navajo Dine against Uranium Mining and the Southwest Research and Information Center - represented by the New Mexico Environmental Law Center, have been fighting the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Hydro Resources, Inc., for the past 16 years, demanding that they keep out of Navajo communities in New Mexico.

Today they turned to the highest court in the United States.

The appeal contends that a two-to-one decision by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in March threatens all of the residents in the area with radioactive contamination as the mine endangers the sole source of drinking water for some 15,000 people in the Crownpoint and Church Rock communities."